2012-13 Kentucky Wildcats Basketball Season Review: The Dark Side of “One and Done”?

Jan 29, 2013; Memphis, TN, USA; Mississippi Rebels forward Murphy Holloway (31) goes up for a dunk and is guarded by Kentucky Wildcats forward Nerlens Noel (3) during the game at the Tad Smith Coliseum. Kentucky Wildcats defeated the Mississippi Rebels 87-74. Mandatory Credit: Spruce Derden–USA TODAY Sports

Righting the ship?

For whatever reason, these Wildcats responded in a 75-70 win over LSU. Even though Kentucky let a big lead slip away again, they responded in the clutch and Alex Poythress was front and center in the improvement. Poythress had 20 points and 12 rebounds and played with real emotion. Nerlens Noel swatted 6 shots. And when some things seemed on the rise, other problems lingered. Ryan Harrow saw just 24 minutes of action nut had 11 points. On the negative side, he had one assist versus two turnovers and was pulled a few times in favor of Jarrod Polson.

The one thing that was lacking on the Kentucky tournament resume at this point was a big quality win. They got that chance with a visit to #16 Ole Miss on January 29. The game had the big game mentality and Nerlens Noel shined with a performance similar to Anthony Davis in last years title game versus Kansas. After a nip and tuck first half, Kentucky pulled away in the second half to take a 73-56 lead thanks to the aggressive play of Alex Poythress and Kyle Wiltjer.

But as the script was for the season, nothing would come easy for UK. Ole Miss responded with a furious 16-0 run and pulled to within 73-72 at the 4:29 mark and the worse news was that Nerlens Noel had four fouls and Ole Miss was going right at him in the paint. But then a funny thing happened. Instead of folding like a cheap card table on the road, these Wildcats responded and showed a will to win that had not been shown all year.

Ryan Harrow drilled a three pointer. The normally poor FT shooting Wildcats hit 9-10 FT’s down the stretch. And despite the four fouls, Nerlens Noel had four huge blocks down the stretch and finished with a school record 12 blocks for the game. All of this came despite just two points for Davis and just one shot taken the whole game. But Kentucky’s other players stepped up with the scoring. Kyle Wiltjer had 26 and Archie Goodwin 24 as the Cats pulled away down the stretch for an 87-74 win.

The Ole Miss win rejuvenated the Wildcats as they ripped off three more wins over Texas A&M, South Carolina, and Auburn. While lingering problems continued to flare, you had the sense that the Wildcat team was rounding into shape and ready to make a real NCAA run. There were warts of course. Alex Poythress continued his disappearing act, taking just 13 shots in the three games and scoring a grand total of 20 points. Even though he had some decent games, John Calipari’s frustration with Ryan Harrow was growing as Jarrod Polson was seeing more and more time. Willie Cauley-Stein was very inconsistent as he would play big one game and regress others and was a true liability at the FT line. And Kentucky continued to struggle on the road, needing overtime to beat a weak Texas A&M team.

But good things were happening. Nerlens Noel was the heart and soul of this team and was making a case for Player of the Year while emerging as a true leader. Julius Mays was starting to rediscover his outside stroke, hitting 10 three-pointers in the three games and becoming more vocal as a leader. Kyle Wiltjer started to emerge as well, showing off some passing skills that he had not shown previously. At times, Wiltjer was the best passer on the team and the team was responding to him on the court and seemed to play some of their best ball when Wiltjer was involved in directing the offense.

After this five game win streak, the seasons longest, Kentucky found themselves back in the AP poll, at #25. Despite the struggles, there was reason for optimism. Five Kentucky players scored in double digits versus Auburn and Wiltjer and Cauley-Stein stepped up in that game. And even though it was just Auburn, Kentucky was able to offset a 1-6 shooting  point performance  for just three points by Archie Goodwin and Alex Poythress taking just five shots. Kentucky was 17-6 on the year and 8-2 in the SEC. And they were winning while overcoming their own flaws. Despite the rough season, Kentucky was poised to make a run at a SEC Title with a road game at Florida.